


It would always be you

by mmok



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Blue Lions Route Spoilers, Fix-It of Sorts, Post-Canon Fix-It, Romance, slight heavy stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-02
Updated: 2019-09-02
Packaged: 2020-10-05 15:44:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,559
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20491265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mmok/pseuds/mmok
Summary: “If you could avoid it, you would.”“I would.”“And if you could change it?”“With everything I am.”She laughs into his ear, a sound heard from a distance, as if he’s being pulled up to the clouds and made to glimpse something that had always been there but only now perceivable enough for him to piece together.“I thought you would.”





	It would always be you

**Author's Note:**

> I only meant to write at most 2k worth of vague light angst about this possibility that could have happened, but it has sort of evolved into much more.
> 
> I hope you enjoy reading it. :)
> 
> Rated M for implicit sexual content(just to be safe)

It all starts with a conversation, a half an hour spent together on the balcony of their shared room, a moment in which has become so mundane that Dimitri only realizes the importance of it when it suddenly comes back at him full throttle. In which he bemoans about all the tasks that he has yet to review and sign and accomplish, all in good jest but also not hiding the clear desire in his words as only his wife will ever hear the King of Faerghus speaking unrestrained and ‘un-regal’ like this; where there is an easy smile on her eternally youthful face, a twinkle of something in those moonlight reflected eyes but nothing more.

Byleth sees the affection he so readily puts on her lap like an oversized bag, dirty and old, but she accepts it like it was free from burden and filled to the brim with all the flowers of the continent.

She dances her fingers around the ring that rests like a fated place on his finger, a small smile that is still rare enough for him to stare but common enough to not rend him speechless anymore- his wife understands.

And whereas once a kindred hand from this person meant that Dimitri could tackle armies and entire empires, meant that his missing eye would hurt a bit less and meant that he could pull himself a bit away from the darkness and reach for the hand of many that stretched to the limit for him (and he takes them, one by one, he takes them all with a heart breaking into gratitude but hers will always be the first that he will take), now, he wants also more.

Byleth’s crown is abandoned on the table along with the rest of the accessories that they make her wear during the day, both for her archbishop and royal duties, she has never cared formalities or social barriers or being the most educated flower of the bunch, and the still new king suspected that that mercenary part of her, that craves freedom from titles and ancestry, honors contract more than anything else, that part of her would probably never change, nor does he wish it to despite all the complaints he receives in the daily by various people who try to speak ill of her upbringing.

Dimitri takes dark satisfaction in looking them right where they stood, two hands leisurely held behind his back as he straightened it, tall and towering with the cape adorned to him at the coronation, he sends them a pointed, well-placed side glare and calmly asks, perhaps even more than five times a day, “Who do you think gave you your lands?”

And they would say, “You, Your Majesty.” 

And Dimitri would counter, “And who do you think made me your king?”

This ill joy watching those people squirm, a more feral part of him that will always be true just as how Byleth will always be of common birth. His single eye quivers with amusement when none of them offers the one word answer everyone knew, but thousand word apologies that Dimitri doesn’t really care to listen.

Byleth’s hand encircles his own, and just like that his thoughts cease, his focus returns to the time they quaintly share and to the soft flesh around his scarred hands.

“Even now, it still eludes me how your skin has remained unscarred. It isn’t that you are invincible, I myself have seen you bleed,” Their hands intertwine, his sole gaze settled on tips of their fingers, the nails illuminated in a blue incandescent light by the moon above. “are you sure you’re not magic?”

He only meant it as a teasing remark laced with intimacy, but the other’s hand squeezes his, and when he finally looks up at the silence (not unusual, but it’s the kind that permeates the air they breathe), it is not uncommon to see the indecipherable face of his former professor’s, but even after all these years, it’s perhaps still one of the mysteries that gnaws at him at any given chance.

“Beloved?”

Byleth’s green eyes flutter, she comes forward, Dimitri holds his words and breath, her ghost touch warms where it lingers. Underneath his eye, tracing the lines that five years of revenge have settled permanently on his face, trails further left, he swallows as it comes dangerously close to the hem of his eyepatch and then-

He _swears _he hears the giggle or tentative laugh, but so immersed and concentrated he is in the hovering thumb just above his hidden eye and of the hand so close where he could practically smell the scent of chamomile leaves lingering from her fingertips, and then it disappears as quick with a flick on his forehead that embarrassingly caught him off guard as he jolts in his seat.

“Dimitri” He half-glares, half-loves the young smile on his wife’s face as he nurses his forehead exaggeratedly in a bid to feign nonchalance. “Magic comes and goes with a passing second.”

He frowns. “That’s not what I mean-“

“But I am to stay forever.” She cups her chin, leaning forward with that same smile as she observes no doubt every inch of his face that is turning red at that moment. Perhaps he should have read more than the promise she offers so sudden and confident in that mundane moment so rare they pass together in their wed life, perhaps Dimitri ought have chosen to not look away, seventeen again and abashed in front of his professor that has every single one of her students wrapped around her finger, but Dimitri doesn’t, and the evening beckons them back to their chambers once the Guardian Moon wind picks up.

.

Dimitri is signing off treaties of land rights for the former Alliance lords. He knows that he has to keep the promise to Claude, but he feels like he might actually be better off chucking all Count Gloucester’s rights whatsoever into the nearest trash bin than spending three hours of solitary isolation inside his office reading through his many words that dripped with typical noble schemes.

Still hesitating between ripping off the paper in his hands and wasting all headache he endured until that moment, or prolonging his suffering for an hour more and then departing for Fraldarius’s estate as soon as time’s up to ask Felix for a spar, Dimitri doesn’t notice the presence creeping into his room (or alternatively he does, but if he’s so uncaring of it then it’s most likely Dedue or anyone he’ll trust his life to) until he smells the fresh scent of chamomile and his mood instantly lights up before it deflates at the speed of a javelin.

“Belo-“

“I’m afraid you’ll have to court me first before you start calling me any affectionate nicknames, Your Majesty.” Sylvain laughs as he sets down the tray in front of him, taking a stray biscuit from the plate with a smugness that Dimitri didn’t exactly miss in seeing again so soon.

He sighs, though he gratefully takes the cup of tea, the hot beverage instantly calming down the throbbing headache he had been having for hours.

Sylvain stays for a while, he talks about his latest skirmish against the Sreng invaders that kept persistently coming from the North, throwing in less than subtle comments about how he just wished Felix would move to his estate permanently as he is sick of calling him over for help each time such thing occurred and Dimitri appreciates the break he takes from the paperwork from the unannounced visit, sipping his tea with perfect practiced etiquette as the other takes territory of his office couch.

“I’ve heard word from Caspar that Professor was on her way to meet the Ordelia chief.”

Dimitri raises an inquisitive brow. “Ordelia? Have they caused any trouble for the church?”

Sylvain shakes his head. “I don’t know, but knowing Professor, it probably has to do with Lysithea’s coming birthday.” The noble grins at memory in his head, one that Dimitri could probably point a very accurate finger to. “It’s really no secret how fond she is of spoiling others with gifts. As her students, we all were too aware of that fact.”

The king reminisces fondly, the more peaceful days passed in leisure in the monastery, where while he still sought revenge there was some sort of comfort washing over him during the day, reminding him of his place and duty to his people, and the plethora of forget-me-nots stuck ingeniously at every random page of his history book, his least favorite subject.

Sylvain goes on about talking about his misadventures with the head of Fraldarius, and Dimitri listens with a more attentive ear.

.

Dedue waits for him by the large doors leading to his throne.

Usually he’s right at his side, but years with the silent man with an_added _equally (or perhaps even more) quiet presence lets him know that his right-hand man wishes to speak in private, and thus he abandons his duties despite the tight schedule for a moment of privacy for them two.

He should have understood sooner that whatever Dedue does is for him at foremost, for Mercedes when he isn’t in the picture, and that if the man chose to intervene Dimitri midst his duties then it would be never for something about himself.

“Almyra?” He speaks out, blank to any other, but there is only Dedue with him, and there are times where he knows more about Dimitri than the man himself would otherwise care to see. 

The larger man nods, his scars littering his face accentuating as he closes his eyes solemnly  \- as if he could feel the sadness -

“Her Grace announced just this morning that she’ll cancel her upcoming visit for a trip to Almyra. I’ve spoken to her immediate regent Seteth, but even he doesn’t know how much time she’ll exactly spend away.”

Dimitri listens with a closed fist, only realizing the ache when it’s ripped away from him. “Oh” He breathes out, voice carried through the empty, cold hallway, finding already immediate reasons for the untimely absence in their frigid, lackluster décor. “Aren’t our hallways a bit... _boorish _to you? Perhaps we should call Annette in to help change it up.”

He blinks at the unhinged gaze that his friend looks him with. “You... Your Majesty wishes to call Annette in?”

“That’s what I said, friend.”

“I apologize. I thought you’d perhaps have more inquiries about Your Grace’s whereabouts.”

Dimitri smiles.

“There’s not a single moment I am not asking about her wellbeing, my friend.”

.

Byleth finds him first when she returns.

She bears gifts for everyone, the giving soul she will always be but Dimitri is the one she goes to first.

She finds him in the middle of another escape from his paperwork, perched against the edge of the balcony as he breathes in the tranquil, fresh air of that Moon, a book he holds distractedly in his hands that Ashe had very kindly lent him, his thoughts materializing right in front of him as he feels the whisk of the air, the heavy sudden weight against his back, a petite, unscarred but familiar hand shielding his vision as a sweet voice whispered into his ear.

“_I’m home_” she mutters, voice brighter than he’s ever heard, he could hear colors in her tone, a bright morning in the way those words slipped from her seamlessly, unaware of how much her normally comforting silence ate him away inside with every day that he waited.

“Home” He answers, grabbing onto the body, twirling them around, ungracefully losing their balance and tripping both of them to the ground in a mess unfitting of their titles (but perhaps that has never mattered, “only our titles have changed” is what she said, as if she could see the anxiety that Dimitri would feel months away with a single glance) and they both laugh into each other, he falls a bit more deeper in love.

They catch up there on the ground, Dimitri’s excitement dying out as he recounts his latest artistic venture with Annette about the palace’s décor when he sees his wife’s amused but confused expression. She tells him of her time in Almyra, of her surprise meeting Claude there right besides the king’s throne with the rest of the heirs and shows the trick she’s learned as she materializes a bucket of forget-me-nots out of air and effortlessly takes his breath away.

He’s abashed, seventeen yet again, and perhaps it was the time they spent apart or the sheer unadulterated longing he bears in his eye, but Byleth confesses to him only, that she takes much personal joy in undoing his kingly façade.

.

When Lysithea passes, him and his friends gather together to mourn.

There’s a different kind of grief in each one of them, Dimitri’s a familiar ache spreading from his chest, it dives down his body like a boulder that will fall if he so moves, it swims up to his arms and hands where he feels the rushing heat of thick blood, wishing for them to come up to his neck and clench it so hard until his fingers break. The grief travels up his face, up to his head where another phantom joins the rest of the others, but there is more peace than guilt these days, it’s getting better for him to cope, but it’s still as difficult as letting go the seething hatred for himself that he’ll find so easily beneath his flesh draped with his country’s hope.

Dimitri didn’t know Lysithea well, but he remembers the times she’s overworked herself to the point of collapse, her unusual penchant for sweets and relentlessness in face of adversity.

He goes find their Professor who had not joined them for the funeral, no one faults or accuses for her absence, every close one that knew both of them doesn’t.

He finds her quietly looking over their garden, where countless flowers bloomed by her request, and perhaps it was more than simple instinct that drove his feet directly to the bed of lilies that bloomed eerily bright for the day.

She overlooks the flowers peacefully, Dimitri joins her soundlessly.

.

“I visited her for her last birthday.” Byleth tells him many moons after without context, but Dimitri knows exactly how long her voice goes back to like a music score of laughably three notes where Dimitri concerns himself more with learning when do the pauses begin and where do they end than how the melody goes.

Byleth holds a piece of aged paper that has indication of having been read countless times. Dimitri has seen it in multiple occasions, but never speculated beyond where did it come from.

“I knew” She fiddles with the organized, cursive writing that he dimly recognizes from the many times Lysithea lent them her notes during their monastery time. His single eye widens, the guilt returns, a voice he’s not heard for almost five moons badger just behind his ear. “And even after all this time of being trusted with that knowledge, that is all I will ever know.”

Byleth looks at him with a sad smile, she folds the letter back and puts it inside the envelope again, unaware of the presence forming itself just in front of him.

She touches his cheek, he flinches back from the touch, and before he can apologize, Byleth holds a single lily to his face, the endearing trick unnerving him more than it comforted this time.

.

Byleth stays less and less time in Fhirdiad.

It has been expected. She had told him beforehand that she had some things to take care of within the church. A truth that she’s been digging up that she hopes will finally change the church for _good._ She leaves with a dashing kiss on his lips, a playful leer and tells him with a glint he has not seen since she’s come back from Almyra to think about new names to baptize the reformed institution.

He’s left with absolutely no word to say as the current ruler of a land with hundreds of years worth devotion to the religion of Seiros in the matter with how quick she comes and goes with these whims.

Ultimately, after many nights of studying and reviewing and asking advice to his trusted companions, after finally hearing Marianne say ‘I do not need a church to pray to the goddess’ and Mercedes’s knowing, curt “It is not Seiros whom I put my faith in”- Dimitri is finally convinced, and he does all the preparations in light of his que-his beloved’s move, already waiting for the inevitable day that would come where Fodlan would see the light of another day, changed and new, and it is only after painstakingly finishing all of these that Dimitri stops to laugh at himself beat tired and sleep deprived about how he never stopped to consider that this project of hers had every right to fail-

-but it wouldn’t.

He looks into Dedue’s eyes, blue and bright, happy as a husband to Mercedes, happy with the new birth of Duscur and more importantly with his new life, enough to properly look at Dimitri and see more than a revered figure to abandon his life to, and maybe, perhaps this was what it meant to be in a marriage.

.

Byleth comes back, very shortly afterwards.

She blazes through the council meeting he holds with his generals, she doesn’t even offer any word of arrival and even Dimitri has to give some face to these comrades given that they were the ones who put their faith in him foremost about the church reformation, he gets up, hesitating between melting his wife in his arms or asserting his royal decree-ness for the sake of etiquette, heavily leaning towards the former when-

-Byleth drops to her knee, Dimitri almost thinks she’s hurt when he realizes a moment later that no one had reacted to it besides him.

(Right. King. No. When did Byleth ever bow to him besides that time they both did for their propo-_meaningful cough_)

“Your Majesty, I have come to request aid from your hand.” Her green, summer, forest, ocean eyes blaze through him like an arrow from the sun.

Dimitri’s a little weak on his knees but he returns the sentiment, the fierce expectation that yet again reminds him of earlier days with his penchant in breaking weapons, and now it’s clear to him that undoing his kingly façade has never been a hobby that his wife indulges with every given chance, but rather something that she does with the ease of breathing.

“Dedue, rally our old friends, our best battalions, our elite squadron, and **give me my lance**.”

“I’ve already sent the word, Your Majesty.” 

.

They are as always, a ragtag of war torn reluctant warriors who forged their closest bonds through the heat of the battle, led not by a heralded noble general but a mercenary turned archbishop who is for all intents and purposes destroying the very church from the inside; they are a comrade less, Dimitri is a king with more callous, dead hands in his than the ones he’s shook, and _even then; _they weave triumphantly through the fight with fearlessness knitted with the threads of their faith (not in the goddess, not in their teacher but from each other). He knows Felix will be there protecting his back from a well-aimed arrow despite all his threats. He’s the Shield of Faerghus, Dimitri sees his father, brother, everything about them in Felix as if they never quite left and their radiance pales in comparison to the ghosts in his head. Sylvain fends off the mindless beasts with his lance, he wields his Crest more like a tool to protect than a reason to hate.

Mercedes looks him dead in the eyes, he hears her words despite all the mayhem “I believe in the goddess, I believe in meeting you”, fresh relief closing his wounds and Marianne holds his shoulder, she says “I wish to live.” she says simply. “For another day with all of you.”

Dedue offers him no words, but words were never something he needed with him and he sees his broad back fending off the enemy cavalry, brute and careful in his protection and that’s all Dimitri will ever ask of him, just his protection.

Dimitri doesn’t know where Byleth is, but if there is a path for him to cut through then that’s where she will be waiting for him. Dimitri is a bit slow of a student, he doesn’t grasp new things well, he breaks weapons left and right but he’s on his feet, running through the enemies with a desperation that doesn’t make him feel like falling deeper into a bottomless ocean suffocating for air but soaring, breathless, until he melts into the sun.

Dimitri’s lungs latch onto his throat as he sees his wife facing off the resuscitated Liberation King. She’s a bit bent over, Sword of Creator pulsing in her hand as the other clutches onto a wound around her midriff.

She tips her head back to him, a grin splitting her battle grazed face as everything that Dimitri wanted to do at that moment was to scold her for looking away in a fight where every second counted.

He pulls Byleth back by her arm as Nemesis cuts where she stood, aggravating the truth of his thoughts as he glares at the undead man. His lance pulsates at the presence of the other, as if it had gained a will at some point and its weight is heavy on his hand, and it’s blood that it calls, it’s blood that it craves-

Byleth tugs onto his cape, she presses a finger in between his brows, loosening the anxious frown forming there.

“You were far more punctual in your time as my student.”

He snorts incredulously at the prospect of her untimely humor when injured, facing off a historical hero of limitless strength and-

“That other one I already expected.”

He hears wyverns in the distance, and the Liberation King clutches his Sword of Creator a little bit tighter.

.

They win.

Of course they win.

Not even with foreign technology that exceeds their own, magic long thought lost through the whims of time, advantageous terrain, an _ancient _hero written in the books as a pivotal figure of heaven rendering strength on their side could they ever outwit their Professor.

.

The sounds of celebrations are far away.

The king’s wounds ache with every step he takes, but he’s far from the only one who feels that way.

The joyous moment permeates their entourage, it turns everything brighter, a bit bolder, he takes his wife’s hand, takes them to where the Goddess Tower is, old, a bit decayed but it holds most of his cherished memories.

Dimitri asks Byleth for a dance, face a bit red from the festivities and alcohol and his beloved happily indulges his whims with a smile.

They hold each other’s arms, something overwhelms Dimitri, decade year old scar that digs itself up again and it hurts, it seethes and burns with the pain of an entire country, it splits his skin, as if tearing every inch that it spread and then- it’s gone (and he understands).

Perhaps he is growing far too attached, taking things for granted as a tear rolls down his eye at the loss of one of the heaviest weights that rests just above where all the love he had laid encapsulated within a thin, scarred, creviced, pulsating muscle.

Byleth cups his face, he doesn’t realize he’s crying until the wetness on his face chills from her close breathing and concerned gaze.

(He thought her indecipherable all those months ago)

“I can do it.” He says, gasping for air, low and hushed as if he was confessing his very sins to a holy figure. “_I can do it_.” He buries his face in her neck, feels her skin crawl in his hold and clings to the small figure like it was his own life. “I can-“

His beloved drinks his words with her mouth, her hands grasping at his hair and pulling down his neck, as if sensing him slipping away again into his self-loathing. Dimitri holds her intimately by her back, he breathes, he cries, he gives everything he cannot put into words to her, he fears of how much of himself he can give if she should ever ask.

Where would he ever draw the line? Where does his loyalty to her end, and where does his people start?

“I can do it.” He says, smelling chamomile and beer in his tongue, flushed and so deeply in love and he’s not sure what to do with the knowledge that he sees it reflected in her eyes.

.

He stands in front of a grave crudely carved with amateur hands.

But it is fine. 

He met her without status, and so shall how their tale will finally end as well.

“I can do it, El.” He lays down carnations besides those that were already there. “I don’t hate you, I never did.” He swallows heavily, reminiscing a dull pain that still rests on his shoulder. That one never did scar. 

“I can stop hating myself from loving you. I love you, El. I always did.”

.

“From me to you.” 

Dimitri stares quizzically at the band given to him, blinking, trying to make sense of the object.

“What is this?”

It must hold some sort of significance to Byleth if she smiled so brightly at him with the simple gift, Dimitri doesn’t dare to ask further, thinking that this must have belonged to someone special.

“A hairband.”

“For me?”

“That’s what I said, my husband.” Dimitri wheezes at the word, flush creeping onto his face as he wordlessly looks away and nods.

He still doesn’t know what to do with it, but for now it stays safely around his wrist.

.

“A penny for your thoughts, my queen?” He joins her by their balcony, draping a light cape over her shoulders even if Verdant Rain Moon is almost upon them.

It’s evening again, late in the night, where the heat of summer stays even when the sun has long set for the day.

Dimitri grabs a lock of his wife’s hair, longer than he’s ever seen, as if her person finally started to age after that first time he’s seen her cut the very fabric of space apart with that sword of hers. _“Fused with the goddess”_ she had said, and Dimitri believed her first time, but the belief grows stronger with each passing thought. 

“Why don’t you guess for free?” She sends him a calculated, challenge, one that he gladly accepts as he snorts in good nature and combs through the strands of mint green.

He looks at her, her eyes expectantly waiting an answer, the way her arms rest over the railing, her white evening gown blending into blue from the dim moonlight, how could anyone fault him from stealing a quick kiss mid-conversation? 

Their embrace is slow, affectionate. Dimitri pulls back first, thoughts returning to their earlier topic as his thumb traces part of her exposed collarbone.

He presses their foreheads together, enticing a chuckle as their hair tangle together.

“You were thinking about them.” He speaks privately into the small space that separates their mouths.

“I am always thinking of them.”

“It couldn’t be helped.”

She rests a hand on his cheek, mint eyes retreating a bit further back from him. “That’s what they say” She pinches his cheek. “When you try three times and it doesn’t work.”

Dimitri squeezes her hand, his heart thumps in his chest for something that it catches from his wife’s expression but he doesn’t.

“I swear, on my name and family, on everything this country stands for, that if it could be avoided then I would have, without a single doubt.”

Byleth breathes in sharply, her gaze falters. “I know, Dimitri, I know you would” she leads him by the hand, away from the balcony where his arms already feel the absence of her supple flesh in the them. 

She leads him inside, Dimitri stops her.

His words caught up on his tongue, unable to speak or move as he grows frustrated with all the things he sees in his head, everything he hopes them to be and anything they do, will be them two together- he doesn’t know why he feels this way, so strongly at that moment, his mouth opens, wordless phrases coming out and Byleth waits, she always wait for him.

“... I love you.” Her face softens, perhaps it isn’t what she expected him to say, but she comes back to his arms, and he convinces himself that was enough.

“I am proud of how far you’ve come, I am grateful to where you will lead this country. I love you, with everything I am.”

He holds her there, head pressed against his shoulder, he swallows down the hesitation that still creeps back from his earlier days each time he’s faced with his particularly vague wife.

“Why do you sound, as if you were going far, far away?”

She stills, more than she usually does. Her hand squeezes beneath him, he feels the slight quavering it does before it leans against him again, deflated.

“If you could avoid it, you would.”

“I would.”

“And if you could change it?”

“With everything I am.”

She laughs into his ear, a sound heard from a distance, as if he’s being pulled up to the clouds and made to glimpse something that had always been there but only now perceivable enough for him to piece together.

“I thought you would.”

Deft fingers take his hand, tracing the familiar shape of his ring again as Dimitri’s hold slacks.

“You’re a good king, Dimitri, and an even greater man.”

“With all this blood in my hands?” He snorts back, her eyes flick to him, cutting through his sentence.

“With all the blood in your hands.”

.

“I am going away for a while.”

Dimitri’s pen freezes in his hold, he gently puts it down, sitting straight on his seat again.

He’s been expecting it, for quite some time now.

“Almyra?”

“If it takes me there.”

“When?”

She leans the side of her face onto her hand, a habit she always does when in thought. “Soon.”

He nods, detached, still thinking about the papers he still has sign. 

“Okay”

“Don’t cause trouble for Dedue.”

He grips the pen tight in his hand, it snaps in two and the ink spills onto the paper, though Dimitri finds himself unable to care for it despite his previous attention to it.

“_Don’t _speak as if you’re already gone.”

.

Dimitri clings to Byleth, sweat slicked between them, fingers half-fused in her hair.

He never lets go of her hand, he buries himself in her scent.

He groans, he whimpers when it overwhelms him, so exposed in his one-eyed gaze that he doesn’t see the arms reaching for him.

He breathes, pulling her onto his lap, his tears mingled in with the sweat, his nails dig into her flesh.

“_Don’t go” _He repeats, hushed and winded into every space that her body takes, he drinks every word she says, every muffled sentence she tries to answer with, but Dimitri just can’t bear himself to hear it. 

Not yet.

_“Don’t leave me too”_

_Byleth pulls him into her chest, he hears what could be a heartbeat under her soft, comforting touch, he hears the sheer wish in his voice, the terror that floods him each time he thinks about it-_

_“I’ll be gone for only one night.”_

_For some reason, it does not quell the growing fear the shape of her silent raucous presence taking deep root in his fragile muscle, already making it its home._

_“Don’t”_

_“I promise to come back to you”_

_“No”_

_“I’ve been gone for longer”_

_He digs his nails into her flesh as if seizing a property that he just claimed ownership to, he pulls her down, his touch grows starved, he eats every sob that escapes, robs every air that she tries to breathe._

_“But in none of them you had to give your word.”_

.

Dimitri never lets go of Byleth’s hand as the days pile up and the ‘Soon’ slithers behind him with an ever growing authority over his well-being.

He does everything to please his wife, like taking her away on a walk between them too far from the capital, unannounced and his paperwork unattended the minute he saw her wistfully looking towards what he suspected to be where they first met, and where her father died.

They ride their horses across the stretching plains of green, the Great Tree Moon was kind on the grass, and it shows by how often his beloved stopped just to glimpse and collect some wild flowers growing confidently in their splendor with the coming spring.

“For you” She says, offering a single little, three petal red flower, tucking it behind his ear as he wills his hand over and over again to not go and suffocate it too hard.

When the sun begins to set and casts a generous orange glow on the interminable fields that never seemed to end no matter how long they had been on the road, Dimitri isn’t too worried.

Remire was still a bit over three days away, he had already finished enough work beforehand to be able to leave it with Dedue, his kingdom will be fine, they enjoy peace and festivals and there are more smiles each time he goes out to meet his people than-

“Let’s head back” Dimitri guiltily announces, mare just behind her wife, regret pricking at the edges of his nape. 

Byleth looks at him, understanding smile stretching, turning into something more as she turns around fully to face him, it was-

“Every step of the way” She tucks another stray flower behind his ear where already countless others laid, tickling the sides of his cheeks. “I’ll be there.”

He blinks, and he thinks to himself that suffering through one night could be bearable if there lays a lifetime ahead of joined hands waiting for the two of them afterwards.

.

“If you could avoid it, then you would.”

“If you could change it, then you would.” He finishes for her.

She nods, radiant smile directed at him. “Rest well, my dear.” 

Dimitri lets go of her hand.

He takes it back a second later.

“If I...” He swallows, he presses forward, he feels her absence even when she’s still there. “If I could choose, then it would always be you.”

Byleth’s eyes widen, she presses a slow finger in between his brows, loosening the anxious frown settling in.

“If I could choose, it would always be all of you.”

He lets go.

.

It all starts with a conversation.

A lull of the mundane that hits back at him with the force of a hurricane when it happens. It’s sour and frustration filled, a humorless laughter that years of observation finally bring fruit to.

Dimitri clasps a hand over his face, the weight of the ring pushing down his entire body, it heats where the old metal touches, he stifles his grieving over something that has happened, but he can’t put an exact finger on.

Dimitri can point someone with frightening accuracy towards where Byleth would most likely be in that time of the day, he can even make out her sleeping figure among an eternally green field of soft whistling grass. He can pinpoint what memory Mercedes is trying to share with two ‘ara ara’ as if he could recognize every look in her crystal eyes.

And perhaps now he could see for himself, a little bit beyond every revered memory he held, a battle scar too many, a lingering look of concern on her face despite her injuries far outweighing Annette’s, her unabashed unconcern for everything that is days or weeks or even moons, maybe there is more to the “When you try three times, and it doesn’t work” or the “Magic comes and goes in a passing second, but I am to stay forever”.

Dimitri doesn’t get a wink of sleep that night, but as far as he’s aware, both him and his dear professor expected that to happen.

.

He rises when the sun begins to creep into the room, he languidly gets off the bed, heart hammering slow but heftily against his chest as he makes his way to their balcony.

He sits around their table, gaze imminently lost at the empty seat across him, faded edges from theusage.

He passes out within seconds, whereas he couldn’t bring himself to even close his eyes in his bed.

.

Dimitri dreams.

He’s weightless in his dream, young and lean, and hair still the object of jesting mockery among his peers. His blue eyes feel substantially naïve, his body is less damaged, but all the more agitated.

He’s seventeen, soaring through clouds and shouting in distress over falling, not even considering about how he even came to be in the first place.

Byleth’s hand takes his own, she leads them to even greater heights, at a greater speed until they fly over all the clouds in the world and-

He sees an orange sky tinted with pink, blue and purple, it’s candy-colored and the moon lays in the distance, big and close and smile lopsided.

The stars twinkle the same way sun reflects off the ice, Dimitri grabs onto one, it falls easily towards his hands, disintegrating into rainbow-colored dust as it comes near, sparkling and lighting his face in myriad of stories before it flickers out.

They dive, downwards, falling like they were going to die, Dimitri’s screams cease instantly after he sees the way Byleth just casually prepares for the inevitable crash.

He sees the ground, he closes his eyes, he feels impact against his body, and then he’s submerging in water, it’s all he ever sees, it’s dark before lighting up again.

For a moment he feels hands pulling him from underneath, thousands of them reaching for him, trapping him where the light doesn’t quite reach.

Dimitri gasps for breath, for help, for salvation.

Byleth appears next to him, Dimitri reaches out, she doesn’t take his hand, she swims further down.

Dimitri dares to take a look, terrified to see thousands of unnamed hands, filled with blood and clawed, seeking revenge against him. At first that’s all he sees, but then he recognizes the dark skinned rough hand and hesitant fingers, he recognizes the gentle, repentant hand that have doted on many, he recognizes the hand a fiancé less, he recognizes the callouses in those palms for holding a sword for too long, those smart, deft ones that have swooned many women and protected Fhirdiad even more.

Dimitri recognizes every single one of them, some more familiar than others until he stumbles on a large hand bellowing with strength and authority, but not as much as all the kindness and love it could hold.

“Fa-“

The scenery explodes, thousand lily petals rising to the surface, carried by vortexes and harsh movements of the ocean, Dimitri is alone.

He blinks, his eyes open (when did he ever close them), he’s holding a cane over his hands, sitting on a familiar pond with a presence that had just began growing inside his bleak, closed chest.

“The fish will escape if you look at them like that.” 

“A-Ah, sorry, Professor.” He gasps, returning to the taught position as he watches his flickering reflection on the lake.

Time passes, the monastery bellows with chatter and peaceful noise, he waits in anxious silence besides their Professor, stealing quick glances at her face, the calm smile that she wears, the unruly strands of dark blue hair (he blinks, he thought he saw a scandalous green for a second) and the violet eyes slide to his, an indecipherable amusement held deep in them.

“Why... did you choose our house, Professor?” He asks, trying to quieten the erratic thumping against his ribs.

“I didn’t.” She responds curtly, reeling her cane in as Dimitri is stuck in that moment, watching the line being pulled and strained, the quick splashing of the water as it mirrored the rate his heartbeat, he gets up the same time the triumphant look settled in her expression, a question already ready by the tip of his tongue-

Professor disappears.

Dimitri is in the sky once more, floating, exhausted of his bravery and stripped of his fortitude.

His professor takes his hand again, he’s reluctant, tired, unwilling to go with, he’s “Not again” but useless to her authority as his teacher and the mischievous glint just by the edge of her lashes.

They rise, high, fast, darting through the formless bodies, piercing them, Dimitri is holding her hand with everything he is, his stomach drops, he feels sick.

She points to something on the ground, a little bit to her right, just underneath the most lavish curve of the sun and he tries to follow her directions slowly, breathless and trying to not spill his guts out embarrassingly.

There is an unending field stretching in the distance, green and smells of spring, of summer around the corner, of wild flowers sprouting confidently in their tiny, but tall splendor.

He sees two familiar figures, yellow and red arguing with each other before they look upwards and spot them. They wave excited hands, more green and lavender than anything else, professor’s hands drop onto his shoulders.

Her mouth opens-

“It would be all of us.” He finishes for her.

.

.

.

“Sleeping in your royal duties? If I had known that this was how you were planning to rule your ‘Unified Kingdom of Faerghus’, then perhaps I should have gone for your crown long ago.”

Dimitri jolts awake, his eyes squinting at the unbearably bright light of the day as he shields his eyes from the sun.

“What are you doing here?” He asks through a contained yawn.

“Professor sent me to give you a message.” He hears steps, weight settling on the chair besides his, a startling flicker of bright crimson through the crevices of his hand. “I do not know why she sent me all the way here to deliver a message, but I suppose I could afford to indulge her a bit- Dimitri?”

Dimitri’s gaze is lost on the figure, her face, all her movements, the rise and fall of her chest and the critical lavender eyes she pins him down with that could see through his very soul. 

He forgets to breathe, he literally forgets to breathe.

“Where is she?”

“A place you should know, is all she said.”

He nods, he surges forward, pulling the other into a tight embrace despite her verbal protests and the slightly painful prick that her hair accessories did to his flesh.

“Welcome back, El.”

He hears a sigh, hesitant arms awkwardly returning his hold as he stifles a tear-filled laughter in her head.

“I never left, Dima.”

.

He finds her sleeping on a field of eternal green, face partially hidden by the grass, but Dimitri can find her even if he another eye less, he could make her out from a crowd full of fish-loving, mint-haired professors.

He drops down next to her, still dressed in his evening garbs and Byleth meets his hand halfway, pulling it to rest over her cheek.

Dimitri lays down, pulls her to him as if he hadn’t done so just hours before, he takes her in, it’s as if he’s seeing her for the first time.

(And perhaps he was)

“If I could choose, it would always be you, Byleth.”

She smiles, her face draws close, he meets her halfway.

“I love you” His beloved squeezes his hand, she speaks a book full of struggles and pain, of choices and history in the timeless three worded sentence, a semi-pause between each word. “I have for a long time.”

“With all this blood in my hands?”

Memories flood back to him. Merged moments that are changed, less frustrated observation, more calm smiles and afternoons spent together fishing at the pond, less five years alone searching, killing, asking for salvation but-

“With all the blood in my hands.”

.

.

.

It all starts with a conversation.

She tugs onto the band around his wrist, mischievous smile spreading as she catches his confused stare.

A lull of the mundane,

Wherever she points he follows, a wide open gold of lands fresh from war and wheat growing for harvest.

hitting Dimitri back-

And they’re reflected in the timeless green, a whole history convoluted and spinning, ghosts that were warm and not lingering with unfinished blood, his own reflection, and-

“Do you see it?”

What does he see? His scarred face, a wry grin more fitting of an anguished heir than the owner of the throne he currently is. Two almond shaped blue pupils, aged and tortured, and the self-love budding with a timid and small growth on earth infertile and bleak, but he could face it with a pride insurmountable, and he could own it, like his birthright.

-with the force of a hurricane when it happens.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading :))
> 
> Please leave a comment if you have the time.
> 
> Edit: A little addendum, but Dimitri's second half part of his 'dream' are actually parts of his 'new' memories from his monastery time with went-back-in-time Byleth, mixed with the usual fantastic elements that are experienced when dreaming. I really wanted to delve more in that (this type of ambiguity being one of my kryptonite), but thought against it because of all the other things that I've already added to my 2k plan rofl
> 
> Edit#2: Changed the last section hehehe


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